Law Commons^™

Clash Of The Titans: Regulating The Competition Between Established And Emerging Electronic Payment Systems, Jane Kaufman Winn

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This article equates the providers of traditional electronic payment services with the Titans of Greek mythology, and the providers of new electronic payment technologies with the Olympians. Professor Winn concludes, however, that unlike the Titans of Greek mythology, these modern Titans appear to be winning in their battle with the upstart Olympians. This article describes the fundamental characteristics of payment systems, reviews the applicable law, and describes the new technologies that were, until quite recently, expected to displace older electronic payment systems. Professor Winn finds that consumers and merchants, by and large, are happy with the existing regulatory structure. And ...

Lessons From A Debacle: From Impeachment To Reform, Cass R. Sunstein

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No abstract provided.

The Jury And Scientific Evidence, Richard O. Lempert

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Read court decisions and commentaries from 100, or evenfive years ago, and you will find that experts and scientific evidence were causing problems then just as they are causing problems now. I do not think that Daubert, Kumho Tire, or any change in a rule of evidence will keep expert scientific testimony from being a difficult area for the legal system. Yet we must still ask: "What are the best terms on which to deal with scientific experts, and how can weimprove the system?"

Juries, Hindsight, And Punitive Damage Awards: Failures Of A Social Science Case For Change, Richard O. Lempert

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In their recent Arizona Law Review article entitled What Juries Can't Do Well: The Jury's Performance As a Risk Manager,' Professors Reid Hastie and W. Kip Viscusi purport to show that juries are likely to do a poor job in setting punitive damages, largely because jurors cannot avoid the influence of what is called "hindsight bias," or the tendency to see the likelihood of an event higher in retrospect than it would have appeared before it happened. In particular, they argue that hindsight bias and other cognitive biases undermine the utility of jury-set punitive damage awards as risk ...

Regulating Doctors, Carl E. Schneider

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Alawyer today can hardly speak to a doctor--or even be treated by one-without being assailed by lawyer jokes. These jokes go well beyond good-humored badinage and pass the line into venom and gall. They reflect, I think, the sense many doctors today have that they are embattled and endangered, cruelly subject to pervasive and perverse controls. This is puzzling, almost to the point of mystery. Doctors have long been the American profession with the greatest social prestige, the greatest wealth, and the greatest control over its work. Indeed, what other profession has been as all-conquering? One may need to go ...

The Case Of The Speluncean Explorers: Revisited, Cass R. Sunstein

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No abstract provided.

The Case Of The Speluncean Explorers: Revisited, Frank H. Easterbrook

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No abstract provided.

Family Law In The Age Of Distrust, Carl E. Scheider

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I have been invited to examine the relationship between American culture and American family law at the end of the century. No doubt I was foolish to accept the invitation, since the topic can hardly be sketched, much less discussed, within the compass of even a lengthy article. On the other hand, that happy fault forces me to accept the luxury of writing a speculative essay and of eschewing the footnotes that are the misery (and majesty) of the academic lawyer. But even thus set free I am still enchained. Family law is shaped by more cultural forces than I ...

Atticus Finch, In Context, Randolph N. Stone

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No abstract provided.

The Assault That Failed: The Progressive Critique Of Laissez Faire (Reviewing Barbara H. Fried, The Progressive Assault On Laissez Faire : Robert Hale And The First Law And Economics Movement (1998)), Richard A. Epstein

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No abstract provided.

Despatches From The Front: Recent Skirmishes Along The Frontiers Of Electronic Contracting Law, Jane Kaufman Winn, Michael Rhoades Pullen

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This Article will provide a short overview of the current efforts in the United States and the European Union to reform contract law to accommodate recent innovations in electronic contracting. Whether changes are needed to current contract law doctrines governing contract formation, effectiveness of contract terms, choice of law and forum provisions, special protections for consumers, and signature and writing requirements, revisions in these areas have all proved controversial. Even in those areas where a consensus may be emerging on whether law reform may be appropriate in some form, consensus is often still lacking with regard to the specific legislation ...

The Hedgehog And The Fox: Distinguishing Public And Private Sector Approaches To Managing Risk For Internet Transactions, Jane Kaufman Winn

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In his essay The Hedgehog and the Fox, Isaiah Berlin used an ancient Greek proverb comparing these animals as a metaphor to express a deep division among thinkers and writers in their understanding of the human condition. In this essay, I extend the metaphor to contrast the differing approaches to risk management taken by the public sector in the exercise of its sovereign functions and that taken by members of the private sector in the conduct of commercial transactions. In light of the differences in these basic approaches to questions of risk management, I will evaluate some widely discussed models ...

The Most Creative Moments In The History Of Environmental Law: "The Who's", William H. Rodgers, Jr.

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My definition of creativity in environmental law is any legal initiative that advances the subject with new levels of analysis, structure, or institutional bridges. There are two requirements: improvement on function and novelty. Law is better if it increases the prospect of protecting the natural world or its inhabitants. Law is novel if it combines mandate, process, or structure in unusual ways.

There are reasons to suspect that environmental law as a field may be more creative than other legal subjects such as trust and estates, contracts, property, or tax law. One reason, as Oliver Houck has said, is that ...

What A Salmon Czar Might Hope For, William H. Rodgers, Jr.

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There is a windowof opportunity in the wave of Endangered Species Act salmon listings that has descended on the Pacific Northwest in 1998 and 1999. Federal law links listings to the "inadequacy of existing regulatory mechanisms." Experience in Oregon has shown that EPA listings cannot be avoided by "voluntary or future conservation efforts."

Meaningful state law that will deter federal overrides must be "current" and "enforceable." With salmon stocks plummeting and with "inadequate" regulation prominently confirmed, what would the naive observer expect from a Washington State legislature intent upon saving the salmon and protecting its authority? A spate of stunning ...

The Use Of Preclusion Doctrine, Antisuit Injunctions, And Forum Non Conveniens Dismissals In Transnational Intellectual Property Litigation, Peter Nicolas

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Conflicting standards among the federal circuits over the applicability of inherent powers in the transnational intellectual property context and the divided authority regarding the jurisdiction of U.S. federal courts over foreign intellectual property claims severely hamper the ability of federal district courts to use these tools in such a manner so as to prevent parties in transnational intellectual property suits from engaging in strategic behavior. This Comment seeks to reconcile these conflicts where possible and, where irreconcilable, to demonstrate that the text and history of federal statutes conferring subject matter jurisdiction on federal courts and placing limits on their ...

West Virginia's Adoption Statute: A History Of A Work In Progress, Lisa Kelly

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More than two years have passed since the Legislature reformed West Virginia's adoption statute. The goal of this article is to provide a kind of legislative history to deepen the reader's understanding of the current statute. This history will include an explanation of the West Virginia Law Institute's Proposal, as well as the Legislature's reaction to it. In Part II, I will detail this history. In Part III, I will explain the operation of the current statute, with mention of the few recent adoption decisions that have construed various provisions. In Part IV, I will look ...

Chain Gangs, Boogeymen And Other Real Prisons Of The Imagination, Lisa Kelly

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This narrative is a fictionalized account of real legal, historical, and interpersonal issues rooted in the social construction of race.

Managing State Trust Lands For Ecosystem Health: The Case Of Washington State's Range And Agricultural Lands, Gregory A. Hicks

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The protection of ecosystem health and wildlife habitat on state trust lands has received increasing attention in public lands literature. This article is meant to contribute to that discussion. It is focused on recently adopted land management policies in Washington state which are intended to restore ecosystem health and wildlife habitat on the 1.1 million acres of range and agricultural trust lands in the upland interior of the state's Columbia Plain. The lands in question are lands originally granted to Washington at statehood by the federal government for the support of the common schools and other public institutions ...

Telemedicine And Integrated Health Care Delivery: Compounding Malpractice Liability, Patricia C. Kuszler

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This Article considers how theories of medical negligence might be applied in the context of telemedicine and integrated delivery health plans. Part Two summarizes the history of telemedicine, its increasing breadth of application and opportunity and promise for the future. Part Three reviews traditional negligence principles and precedents and demonstrates how they might be applied when a telemedicine interaction results in negligence and harm to the patient. Part Four discusses evolving theories of shared liability applicable to health plans and managed care entities. Finally, Part Five demonstrates how shared liability theories will be applied to situations involving telemedicine technologies.

How Copyleft Uses License Rights To Succeed In The Open Source Software Revolution And The Implications For Article 2b, Robert W. Gomulkiewicz

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The computer industry moves from one “next great thing” to the next “next great thing” with amazing speed. Graphical user interface, object-oriented programming, client-server computing, multimedia software, Java applets, the network computer, and the Internet have all been hailed as technological breakthroughs at one time or another. Some of these promising developments fizzle, some evolve and succeed slowly, and some revolutionize the industry overnight.

Led by a group of software developers known as “hackers,” the latest “next great thing” is “open source” software. The word “source” refers to software in source code form. Source code is the collection of instructions ...

Search Tools: Skills And Strategies, Robin Schard

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No abstract provided.

A Matter Of Prostitution: Becoming Respectable, Beverly Balos, Mary Louise Fellows

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Feminists have achieved significant antiviolence legal reforms in the areas of domestic abuse, sexual harassment, and rape over the past three decades. These reforms, however, have reinforced old borders between the traditional categories of violence and prostitution and have constructed new borders by maintaining the distinction between worthy and unworthy women. Despite these flaws, the law reform efforts have the capacity to transform the legal and social meaning of prostitution. By adopting an approach that transcends consent or coercion and private or public, Professors Fellows and Balos use the concept of respectability to introduce an analytically powerful framework for rethinking ...

Highlights Of The Fiftieth Session Of The United Sub-Commission On Prevention Of Discrimination And Protection Of Minorities, David Weissbrodt, Mayra Gomez, Bret Thiele

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fiftieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.8 The Sub-Commission also considered resolutions on country situations in Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Belarus, Bhutan, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea and Mexico.9 In addition, the Sub-Commission took a new initiative by adopting a thematic resolution, focusing on the protection of human rights defenders in nine countries, including Burma, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Honduras, Indonesia, Nigeria, the Philippines, Tunisia, Turkey and the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. 10 The Sub-Commission completed considerable work in the area of economic, social and cultural rights, including the Final Report on ...

Lenders And Land, Ann Burkhart

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Using land to secure loans has been a particularly durable human institution. Mortgages 1 have existed since antiquity, 2 primarily because land generally retains its value and is permanent and immovable. In societies with largely nonmonetary economies, such as feudal England, land also has been particularly valued as a source of livelihood and of power. Therefore, land has been and continues to be desirable security for loans.

The Transformation Of The Juvenile Court--Part Ii: Social Structure, Race, And The "Crack Down" On Youth Crime, Barry C. Feld

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Part I briefly analyzes the social history of the juvenile court and argues that the progressive reformers who created the juvenile court designed it to discriminate against "other peoples' children," a feature that carries over into contemporary juvenile justice administration. Part II analyzes the "constitutional domestication" of the juvenile court. It places the U.S. Supreme Court's juvenile court "due process" decisions in a broader social structural context and argues that the Court emphasized procedural safeguards as part of its broader agenda to protect the civil rights and liberty interests of minorities. Part III analyzes the impact of the ...

Java And Microsoft: How Does The Antitrust Story Unfold?, Daniel J. Gifford

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RAPID developments in the software industry underlie both the Gov ernment's antitrust proceedings against the Microsoft Corporation 1 and the lawsuit brought by Sun Microsystems, Inc. ("Sun") against Microsoft in which Sun is asserting claims grounded in breach of contract, trademark infringement and unfair competition. 2 In October 1997, the Government challenged the Microsoft Corporation's right to bundle its internet browser (the Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0) with its Windows 95 operating system. 3 That proceeding was brought as a request for an order to show cause why Microsoft should not be held in contempt for violating a ...

Researching Labor Arbitration And Alternative Dispute Resolution In Employment, Suzanne Thorpe, Laura J. Cooper

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What kinds of information can we expect to find when doing research in alternative dispute resolution? To the extent that ordinary issues of law arise when considering methods of alternative dispute resolution, such as whether an agreement to arbitrate is judicially enforceable or whether communications in the course of mediation enjoy an evidentiary privilege, ordinary sources of legal research remain appropriate. This research guide generally does not describe those research

The Principle Of Non-Refoulement: Article 3 Of The Convention Against Torture And Other Cruel, Inhuman Or Degrading Treatment Or Punishment In Comparison With The Non-Refoulement Provisions Of Other International Human Rights Treaties, David Weissbrodt, Isabel Hortreiter

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Because of persecution, civil war, and economic despair, millions of people flee from their homes and go to live in other countries where they can stabilize their lives and find a safe place for themselves and their families. In 1998, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated the number of people fleeing their home countries to exceed 22 million. 1 The right to seek and enjoy asylum is a well established principle in international law. 2 It has, however, been interpreted consistently as the right of the sovereign state to grant or deny asylum to those within its territory ...

The Ada In Turmoil: Judicial Dissonance, The Supreme Court's Response, And The Future Of Disability Discrimination Law, Stephen F. Befort, Holly Lindquist Thomas

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The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) 1 was enacted in 1990 with considerable fanfare and support. A broad-based coalition of supporters testified in favor of the legislation before committee hearings 2 and both houses of Congress passed the legislation by wide margins. 3 President George Bush, in signing the ADA into law, described the new statute as "an historic opportunity" 4 representing "the full flowering of our democratic principles." 5

Spin-Offs, Fiduciary Duty, And The Law, Edward Adams, Arijit Mukherji

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In recent years, merger and acquisition activity has captured the corporate headlines, reaffirming the popular view that bigger is better. Yet the benefits of such empire building are belied by evidence that corporate spin-offs generally add more value to a business or group of businesses. Indeed, the advantages of spin-offs have not been lost on some of the more astute corporate executives, and although mergers and acquisitions may make better copy, spin-offs have been quietly on the rise. Companies such as AT&T, General Motors, ITT, Sprint, Dun and Bradstreet, and Sears have successfully reaped the benefits of performing tax-free ...